The Painter's Apprentice (18 page)

‘That’ll be the cyclamens. And the spring flowers are coming in now the weather’s more clement. You’ll need to keep your eyes
open as they’ll arrive thick and fast.’

‘Probably more quickly than I can paint them,’ said Beth with a rueful smile. ‘I’ll not pick anything from a plant where there
is only a single bloom.’

‘I’d appreciate that. Some of the plants we have here are rare and in some cases may be the only one in the country. We need
to collect the seeds for propagation.’

‘Bishop Compton was telling me that you are both members of the Temple Coffee House Botany Club,’ said Beth.

‘I wouldn’t miss our weekly meetings at the Rainbow Inn for anything. You never know who will have recently travelled abroad
and returned with exotic seeds or plants for sale or exchange.’

‘I can see you’re busy,’ said Beth, ‘so I’ll take a walk around the garden now and perhaps I may pick two or three of the
pink cyclamens to study?’

George London nodded and turned back to his rose bushes.

‘There’s a great deal more to George than simply being a gardener,’ said the Bishop.

‘He was apprenticed to John Rose, King Charles’s gardener. and he’s travelled extensively in France and Holland to further
his
knowledge. He and his business partner own the largest nursery in England, too. Over a hundred acres at Brompton Park.’

‘I’ve heard my brother John talk of the nursery,’ said Beth, ‘but I didn’t realise it was Mr London who owned it.’

‘I’m going to see how my latest consignment of trees are settling in. Come and find me if you need anything.’ Bishop Compton
strode off.

Beth spent a happy half-hour wandering through the grounds taking note of interesting plants for future reference before returning
to the cyclamen growing beneath the cork oak. She picked three blooms in different stages of development and carried her prizes
carefully back to her new studio.

Anticipation began to build inside her. Much as her heart was at Merryfields, her visit to Fulham Palace offered her new and
exciting opportunities to further her skills. Humming to herself, she put on her old painting apron and set to work.

April 1688

Beth was deeply absorbed in capturing in watercolour a particularly delicate shade of green on the undersides of the petals
of an Illyrian sea daffodil and nearly jumped out of her skin when a pair of hands appeared from behind her and covered her
eyes.

‘Guess who?’ said a voice.

‘Cecily? Is it you?’ asked Beth, perplexed. ‘What are you doing here?’

‘It’s not Cecily!’ said the voice, full of laughter.

Beth turned to see that Princess Anne stood before her, eyes alight with mischief. She sank into a deep curtsy, her heart
beating like a hammer on an anvil.

‘Please rise, Beth. We are quite alone and there is no need to stand on ceremony. Bishop Compton told me you were here and
I couldn’t resist coming to find you. Such pretty pictures you are painting! But do you keep well, my friend?’

‘Very well, as you see. And your own health?’

‘God is smiling on me and I await the birth of my baby with great happiness.’

‘That pleases me more than I can say,’ said Beth, taking Anne’s proffered hand. ‘But you must not tire yourself.’ She pulled
out one of the chairs from the table for Anne to sit on. ‘So tell me your news.’

‘George is so very happy about the child but, of course, it’s not our personal delight that matters.’

‘Of course it matters!’

Anne shook her head. ‘The succession is the important thing. Although my sister Mary is the heir, so far, she has no surviving
children. Should this state of affairs continue, in time I would be queen and so my child may be most important to the state.
I pray, oh how hard I pray for a son! We
cannot
have a papist on the throne.’

‘How is the Queen?’ asked Beth.

‘Advancing in her pregnancy,’ said Anne, her face tight with resentment. ‘But I tell you,’ she said, ‘there is something most
strange about it all. Her priests are so
very
sure that the child is a boy.’

‘But no one can possibly know until the babe is born.’

The Princess lowered her voice. ‘Not unless there is terrible wrong doing afoot. My father is absolutely determined to have
a son, a
Catholic
son, to be his heir. When a man is so very unyielding, the people should question his intentions. And there is a great deal
of gossip at Court. Not once has my stepmother allowed me to touch her belly to feel the baby within. Not once!’

‘Is that significant?’

‘I am her stepdaughter. I carry a child myself. What would be more natural than to allow me to feel her baby move?’ Anne’s
lips tightened. ‘I am banished from her bedchamber. She allows no one near her when she is dressing or bathing. I tell you,
there is something most odd about this so-called pregnancy.’

Beth stared at Anne in consternation. ‘Do you mean that you fear the Queen may not be with child?’

Anne stood up abruptly. ‘I wish with all my heart that it is so. The Queen tells us she is to give birth but there is too
much mystery. I believe either she merely stuffs a cushion under her bodice or that when the baby is born, should it be a
girl, it will be smuggled away and a boy child substituted instead.’

There was a long silence while Beth assimilated this terrible idea. ‘She would never be able to do that,’ she said, at last.
‘Someone would know.’

Anne sighed. ‘You understand nothing of life at Court, Beth, my dear. My stepmother is the Queen and my father is the King.
He is irrational and deeply stubborn in his beliefs.’

‘But what could they do?’

‘Everything has its price. And everyone. Besides, a newborn, soothed with a good feed and a drop of brandy, could be smuggled
into the birthing chamber in a warming pan. No one would be the wiser. I shall only believe that the Queen has truly given
birth to a son if I am present when he is parted from his mother.’

‘Time will show us the truth,’ said Beth, still struggling with the dreadful vision of some poor cottager’s infant son drugged
and crammed into a warming pan.

‘Indeed it will!’ said Anne, standing up. ‘But I am disturbing you in your work.’ She took Beth’s hand, turning it over in
her own. Pouting a little, she said, ‘I had hoped you might wear the ring I gave you.’

‘It’s far too beautiful to wear every day,’ stammered Beth. ‘I save it for special occasions.’

‘Wear it every day, Beth. How many of us know when the Good Lord will see fit to gather us into His arms?’ She laughed. ‘Don’t
look so worried; I’m sure He will spare you a little longer.’

After Anne had left, Beth returned to her work, staring with unseeing eyes at the half-finished painting of the Illyrian sea
daffodil
while she went over and over what Anne had said. What she was suggesting was a monstrous political deception on the King’s
part. But was it simply a figment of Anne’s overworked imagination?

Joshua and Samuel were at home when Beth returned to Chelsea that evening. She followed the sound of laughter into the drawing
room and found them playing cards with Cecily.

‘You cheated, Josh!’ protested Cecily as her uncle cleared the table of cards.

‘He always cheats,’ said Samuel.

‘That certainly used to be true,’ said Beth as she entered the room.

‘Beth!’ Joshua ran towards her and lifted her up, knocking her hat over her eyes.

‘Put me down!’

‘Not until you say you’re sorry!’

‘What for, telling the truth?’

‘It’s not true! I don’t
always
cheat, only sometimes. Not like my angelic twin.’ He lowered her to the floor. ‘Anyway, you’re late,’ he said. ‘You’d better
hurry up and change before supper.’

‘I’ll come upstairs with you,’ said Cecily. ‘Grandmama has guests for dinner tonight and she bought me a new lace shawl today.
We had
such
fun shopping at the Exchange …’

Cecily prattled away as she accompanied her sister upstairs but Beth’s thoughts were with Anne’s terrible accusation. Was
it really possible that the King and Queen were desperately intent upon deceiving the nation? She supposed she would never
know unless the child was a girl, in which case perhaps Anne’s mind had been turned by her own pregnancy.

‘Beth? Are you listening to me?’

‘Sorry, Cecily, what did you say?’

‘Harry de Montford is coming for supper. Oh, and Grandmama’s
doctor and Harriet and her horrid husband will be here.’ Cecily clasped her hands to her breast and sighed. ‘Harry de Montford
is so very elegant, don’t you think? He has become fast friends with Josh and Sam and they are up to all
kinds
of fun together.’

‘Mischief, I expect you mean.’

‘There’s no malice in high spirits, Beth. Just because you lead such a staid life and you’re always buried in your painting
…’

‘At least I’m doing something worthwhile, Cecily, not simply frittering my time away shopping and playing cards.’

‘That’s very unkind.’ Cecily’s eyes glistened with sudden tears. ‘It’s not a crime to make myself pretty or to enjoy myself.
At least I shall find a husband, while you will remain an old maid, your eyesight fading as you sit alone painting in a freezing
attic.’

‘Now who’s being unkind?’ Wounded, Beth turned away from her sister’s accusing eyes while she opened the clothes press. There
was a glimmer of pale blue silk amongst her more workaday cotton dresses and she pulled out one of the gowns Anne had given
her. Perhaps it was too fine for supper in Chelsea? But it would please her to see Cecily and Arabella raise their eyebrows
in surprise at seeing her in such a beautiful gown.

The air reverberated with Cecily’s sighs, which Beth ignored, as she shook the folds out of the skirt and changed in silence.
Then she unwrapped Anne’s sapphire ring from the little velvet purse she had made for it and slipped it on. It really was
very beautiful, she thought, as she held her hand out in front of her. Anne was right; she should wear it and enjoy it every
day.

‘You’re looking unusually modish tonight, Beth,’ said Cecily at last, with more than a suggestion of a pout. ‘No one will
notice that I have a new lace shawl.’

Beth relented. ‘It’s very pretty and sets off your shoulders beautifully.’

‘It does, doesn’t it?’ said Cecily, smiling again as she studied her reflection in the looking glass. ‘I wonder if Harry will
like it?’

‘He’s bound to,’ said Beth with a dry smile. ‘He likes all pretty girls. Men like Harry de Montford are not always to be trusted.’

‘And how do you know that, miss?’ Cecily lifted her chin in defiance at Beth. ‘What experience have
you
of men’s promises?’

There really was no satisfactory answer to that, thought Beth.

The other guests were assembled in the drawing room. Harry de Montford leaned gracefully against the mantelpiece and the twins
lounged on the tapestry armchairs.

Lady Arabella frowned at Beth and Cecily. ‘Ah, there you are! At last.’

The two sisters were presented to Lady Arabella’s daughter, Harriet, who appeared to have no memory of having met them before,
and then to her husband, Francis Crawford, a bow-legged, elderly man with thinning hair and a sour expression. He wore a lemon
yellow coat with a black and sulphur striped waistcoat and bored the company with dry tales of his business dealings in the
mercer’s trade.

Beth suppressed a giggle at the irreverent thought that he looked like a bad-tempered wasp.

‘And this is Dr Edmund Latymer,’ said Lady Arabella. ‘He’s been such a help to me as I suffer so from fits of anxiety.’

Dr Latymer, perhaps a year or two older than Beth, had a pleasant, if unremarkable face. He was quietly dressed in olive-drab
but the quality of the lace at his wrists was excellent.

Beth reflected that Lady Arabella liked to surround herself with young men who were of use to her.

Lady Arabella and Sir George led the way into the dining room.

Harry de Montford held out his arm for Beth but somehow Cecily, a dazzling smile upon her lips, was between them, ignoring
Dr Latymer’s offer to lead her in.

Harry led Cecily away with a mocking lift of his dark eyebrow as he looked back over his shoulder at Beth.

Dr Latymer stepped forward. ‘May I?’

Beth took his arm with a smile and was sorry to discover that he walked with a bad limp.

‘Old hunting accident,’ he said dismissively. ‘Happened when I was a young and impetuous youth. Changed my life, though. A
doctor saved my leg and it was then I decided to study medicine.’ His lips curved in a self-mocking smile. ‘As only the third
son of an earl, my father was happy to let me do what I pleased.’

Lady Arabella’s dining table, laid with polished silver and gleaming glass, shimmered under the soft glow of a myriad of scented
beeswax candles. Beth thought she had never seen so many silver salts, sweetmeat and syllabub glasses, crisp damask napkins
and matching knives and forks for each person.

Sir George presided at the head of the table, smiling benignly as he deftly carved the haunch of venison. Liveried manservants
silently poured wine as their mistress chattered brightly to her guests.

Beth found herself placed between Harry de Montford and Edmund Latymer.

‘How very lovely you look tonight,’ said Harry lifting her fingers to his lips.

Cecily scowled at Beth from the opposite side of the table.

Harry held Beth’s hand, studying the heavy sapphire ring that flashed on her finger. Really, the man was impossibly handsome!
His close attention made Beth feel uncomfortably flustered. ‘I believe you have become fast friends with the twins?’ she said,
pulling her fingers free of his.

‘Indeed. They have taken me to visit some of the delights of the city that I hadn’t already found for myself.’

‘I can imagine.’ Beth caught Joshua’s sardonic glance from across the table. ‘I do hope they aren’t leading you into wicked
company?’

‘I suppose if that were the case, Miss Ambrose, then I would hardly admit to it, would I?’

‘Tell us how you are faring at Fulham Palace,’ Samuel asked. ‘Still painting your little flower pictures?’

Beth gritted her teeth. ‘I am continuing with my botanical studies,’
she said. ‘The Bishop of London is very pleased with what I have produced so far …’

‘The Bishop of London!’ Lady Arabella’s laugh was shrill. ‘Did you hear that, Sir George? I cannot imagine why you bother
with him, Beth. Of what use is he to you when the King himself has rusticated him in disgrace?’

‘He has provided me with my own studio and allows me free rein to select any of the plants and flowers from his gardens for
me to paint,’ said Beth in quick defence.

‘But will he find you a husband or a position at Court?’ Lady Arabella raised one painted eyebrow and fixed Beth with her
gimlet glare. ‘No, I thought not. If you wish to advance in the world you must look elsewhere.’

Beth opened her mouth to make a sharp retort but then thought better of it since it was only by Lady Arabella’s grace that
she was able to visit the palace every day.

‘But you must admit, Lady Arabella,’ said Harry de Montford, ‘that Miss Ambrose is looking very well tonight. Perhaps she
has no need of a bishop’s help to find herself a husband.’